S.F. lawyer Andrew Downey Orrick dies

Published 4:00 am, Saturday, February 2, 2008

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Undated handout image of Andrew Orrick, the San Francisco attorney who headed the firm Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe and was an Eisenhower appointee to the Securities and Exchange Commission from 1955 to 1960. Died Jan. 27. Family Handout / less

Undated handout image of Andrew Orrick, the San Francisco attorney who headed the firm Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe and was an Eisenhower appointee to the Securities and Exchange Commission from 1955 to 1960. ... more

Photo: Family Handout

S.F. lawyer Andrew Downey Orrick dies

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A memorial service will be held this month for Andrew Downey Orrick, member of a prominent San Francisco family of lawyers and a former member of the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Mr. Orrick, known as Downey, died Sunday at his San Francisco home. He was 90.

He spent his legal career with the firm now called Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP, founded in 1885. His father, William Orrick, headed the firm, and a brother, also named William, was a federal judge who died in 2003.

Downey Orrick graduated from Yale in 1940 and served in the Army during World War II, reaching the rank of captain. He attended UC Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco after the war and joined the law firm in 1947.

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Active in Republican politics, he was San Francisco chairman of Citizens for Eisenhower in 1952, during Dwight Eisenhower's first run for president, and a decade later was Northern California chairman of Richard Nixon's unsuccessful campaign for governor of California.

Mr. Orrick became regional administrator of the SEC in San Francisco in December 1954 and was appointed to the commission by Eisenhower five months later. He was renominated to a new term in 1957, spent a brief period as acting chairman and served until 1960.

He then returned to the law firm but made a moral choice to get out of the field of securities law, one of the firm's specialties, said his nephew, attorney William Orrick III.

"My uncle was a very ethical guy," he said. "He decided he would not practice in that area because he thought he would be using influence he had gained as a result of his governmental position in a way that would be unethical, so he became an estates and trusts lawyer. Today, it would be shocking for anybody to do that."

Mr. Orrick remained with the firm and was a partner when he retired in the late 1970s. Always athletic - he hit what was then the longest home run in the history of Yale's baseball team - he spent much of his retirement golfing and gardening, dividing time between San Francisco and a home overlooking the 12th hole of the Pebble Beach golf course, his nephew said.

"He was a quiet man who liked his pipe, his comfy shoes, a warm fire and his books," said his daughter, Didi Orrick Magee of Phoenix.

Mr. Orrick's wife of 47 years, the former Marjorie Soule, died in 1999.

In addition to his daughter, he is survived by four sons: Andy Orrick of San Francisco, Winsor Orrick of San Rafael, Murray Orrick of Corte Madera and Sam Orrick of Phoenix. He also is survived by eight grandchildren.

A private family service was held Friday, and a public memorial service is scheduled for Feb. 28 at 3 p.m. at the chapel at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco.